DOCSLIB.ORG

U·M·I University Microfilms International a Bell & Howell Information Company 300 North Zeeb Road

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
U·M·I University Microfilms International a Bell & Howell Information Company 300 North Zeeb Road INFORMATION TO USERS This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfilm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter face, while others may be from any type of computer printer. The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleedthrough, substandard margins, and improper alignment can adverselyaffect reproduction. In the unlikely event that the author did not send UMI a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if unauthorized copyrightmaterial had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, charts) are reproduced by sectioning the original, beginning at the upper left-hand corner and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. Each original is also photographed in one exposure and is included in reduced form at the back of the book. Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced xerographically in this copy. Higher quality 6" x 9" black and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations appearing in this copy for an additional charge. Contact UMI directly to order. U·M·I University Microfilms International A Bell & Howell Information Company 300 North Zeeb Road. Ann Arbor. M148106-1346 USA 313/761-4700 800/521-0600 Order Number 9429649 Subversive dialogues: Melville's intertextual strategies and nineteenth-century American ideologies Shin, Moonsu, Ph.D. University of Hawaii, 1994 V·M·I 300 N. Zeeb Rd. Ann Arbor, MI 48106 SUBVERSIVE DIALOGUES: MELVILLE'S INTERTEXTUAL STRATEGIES AND NINETEENTH-CENTURY AMERICAN IDEOLOGIES A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE DIVISION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAII IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN ENGLISH MAY 1994 By Moonsu Shin Dissertation Committee: Arnold Edelstein, Chairperson Steven Curry PauL Lyons Rob Wilson David Bertelson Copyright 1994 by Moonsu Shin iii To Kilsoon Lee, for all of her love, support, and patience, with deepest affection and thanks iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The germinous seeds of this work were planted by Mitchell Breitwieser, whose well-ordered and stimulating lecture at Berkeley aroused my interest in Melville and the American Renaissance. Arnold Edelstein was instrumental in sprouting the seeds into ever-growing greeness of interest and enthusiasm years later. I was fortunate to take his graduate seminar on Melville, which made irresistibly attractive its subject's encyclopedic world of hybridity. He has since been my guide in American life as well as in academic research. lowe great debts to Rob Wilson, who was always willing to share his brilliant ideas, sympathetic and trenchant, and also incomparably generous with his time and expert advice in matters intellectual and practical. Without his constant encouragement and his faith in my scholarly ability my life at Hawaii would have been dreary. I am also indebted to the other members of my committee. Special thanks are due to Paul Lyons, whose expertise in Melville scholarship and careful reading of the manuscript were invaluable. I am grateful to David Bertelson for his detailed comments on both the content and style of the dissertation. Steven Curry kindly agreed to participate in the final oral exam and made helpful comments. v I would like to express my thanks to Hee-jin Park, the advisor of my MA studies at Seoul National University, for her unfailing concern and full confidence in my work; to Steve Bradbury and Michael Seth for their friendship and proofreading; to Wimal Dissanayake, John Rieder, Gary Pak, Bevra Dang, and Helen de Leon Palmore for their kindness and encouragement. I thank Hankuk University of Foreign Studies and the East-West Center for their financial support. My children, Heeryoon and Heekang, have grown up proudly despite my long absence from home; they have nurtured this work and me more deeply than they know. lowe the most to my wife, Kilsoon Lee, whose support and love made possible the completion of my graduate studies which, at times, seemed interminable; so it is to her that this dissertation is dedicated, with love and gratitude. vi ABSTRACT This dissertation examines Herman Melville's self­ consciously intertextual use of antebellum popular texts to register and critique the prevailing ideological assumptions and values which underwrote the American exclusionary culture of the period. Through a subversive dialogue with his source texts which he maintains while refashioning them into his own texts, Melville simultaneously exposes and parodies, installs and negates, the dominant American ideologies embedded in them. This study also focuses on Melville's deconstructive practice in an attempt to explore his concern with the interactions among narrative, generic conventions, and ideology. Consisting of five chapters and an epilogue, this dissertation begins with a theoretical discussion of intertextuality, ideology, and the problems of traditional approaches to Melville's use of his sources, and then goes on to examine four texts which prominently exemplify how Melville uses the intertextual practice of subversive dialogue as a central textual strategy. Chapter Two deals with Typee in which Melville's dialogue with two American travel narratives, David Porter's Journal of a Cruise Made to the Pacific Ocean and Charles Stewart's A Visit to the South Seas, textualizes his critique of the ideologies of American expansionism and messianic nationalism. The third vii chapter discusses the relationship between Israel Potter and its key intertext, Henry Trumbull's Life and Remarkable Adventures of Israel R. Potter, examining Melville's demystification of the myth of the American Revolution and his deconstruction of the hero-oriented American biographical tradition. Chapter Four explores the antebellum racial ideologies which served to justify the institution of slavery by analyzing the way Melville refashioned a chapter of Amasa Delano's A Narrative of Voyages and Travels into llBenito Cereno." Chapter Five discusses the Indian-hating section in The Confidence-Man to demonstrate how its intertextual dialogue with James Hall's frontier narrative, Sketches of History, Life and Manners in the West, exposes the complicity of the rhetoric of Manifest Destiny in the removal and subjugation of American Indians. Finally, the epilogue analyzes the significance of Melville's meta-commentaries on the narrative form of fiction and explores the social potential of his subversive poetics for our age. viii TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgments v Abstract vii Chapter I. Reading Melville: Intertextualityand Ideology 1 Chapter II. Melville's "Narrative of Facts": Typee, or Uncovering the Ideologies of "Civilization" ..... 39 Chapter III. Refashioning American Autobiography: Israel Potter, or Reenvisioning the American Revolution 89 Chapter IV. Melville's "Black-Letter" Text: "Benito Cereno," or Critiquing the Antebellum Racial Ideologies .... 130 Chapter V. Rewriting "Forest Histories": The Confidence-Man, or Demystifying the Ideology of Manifest Destiny.. 173 Chapter VI. Epilogue: Melville's Legacy 219 Bibliography 235 ix CHAPTER I READING MELVILLE: INTERTEXTUALITY AND IDEOLOGY III don't like this cobbling sort of business--I don't like it at all; it's undignified; it's not my place, II complains the Pequod carpenter, when he is told to rework the coffin he made for Queequeg into a life-buoy, the one which will eventually save Ishmael. 1 Melville, as Harrison Hayford has suggested, seems to grumble through the voice of his character about his own practice of continual tinkering and reworking in the course of producing Moby-Dick. 2 In fact, it has now been amply demonstrated that Melville stuck to "this cobbling sort of business, II however undignified and distasteful he may have found it, for his trade of book­ making throughout his career. From Typee and Gmoo through Moby-Dick to Billy Budd, Melville's work was constructed upon his willful practice of purposive mixings and interweavings of experiences and knowledge, inventions and borrowings, and the factual and the fictional. As Charles Olson has suggested in Call Me Ishmael, Melville reads as he writes, and writes as he reads, borrowing and appropriating, cutting and rearranging all sorts of facts, formulas and motifs, tropes and languages, styles and genres. 3 At another well-known metatextual moment in Redburn, Melville more specifically explains how books are produced: writers 1 manufacture books out of "odds and ends" of old "yarns," just as sailors pick "yarns ' l to pieces so they can be "twisted into new combinations" (Redburn, 116). This particular, if not unique, writing practice of mixing and tinkering makes for the notoriously unwieldy shape of the Melvillean texts, which have often been characterized as "botches," a "hodge-podge," a "monstrous compound," or a bit approvingly, a "disorderly order. ,,4 Melville's text perhaps can best be figured in Queequeg's coffin itself, which is also a canoe, later used as a sea­ chest, and finally made over into a life-buoy. Made of "heathenish" old lumber aboard an American whaler, the canoe-coffin-sea-chest-life-buoy is, in cultural terms, a composite of Yankee craftsmanship and the savage art of tattooing, whose manufacture has been prompted by Queequeg's cross-cultural recognition of
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Israel Potter Deported Rodrigo Lazo
    Israel Potter Deported Rodrigo Lazo Leviathan, Volume 22, Number 1, March 2020, pp. 146-165 (Article) Published by Johns Hopkins University Press DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/lvn.2020.0009 For additional information about this article https://muse.jhu.edu/article/750720 [ This content has been declared free to read by the pubisher during the COVID-19 pandemic. ] Israel Potter Deported RODRIGO LAZO University of California, Irvine This lecture aims to break down the walls separating fields of study by inter- preting Israel Potter in relation to concerns about migration and transnational labor that are common in Latino/a/x and trans-American studies. Turning away from a critical emphasis on the book’s dedication to the Bunker Hill Monu- ment as a response to national US mythology, I consider Potter’s movement away from home and his status as a refugee to engage questions of national belonging. Israel Potter is an important book for those who study migration in the Americas and the transatlantic dimensions of the age of revolutions. In the spirit of C.L.R. James’s commitment to reading Melville through “the world we live in,” I argue that Israel Potter’s condition as a migrant subject who is denied national reintegration at the end of his life shares structural similarities to recent governmental efforts to detain and deport migrants, some of whom have lived in the United States for years. begin with profound gratitude to the conference organizing committee for inviting me to deliver this lecture. Your kindness inspires me, partic- I ularly because I can think of many Melville scholars whose work would merit this distinction, and so I am humbled.
    [Show full text]
  • Antarctica: Music, Sounds and Cultural Connections
    Antarctica Music, sounds and cultural connections Antarctica Music, sounds and cultural connections Edited by Bernadette Hince, Rupert Summerson and Arnan Wiesel Published by ANU Press The Australian National University Acton ACT 2601, Australia Email: [email protected] This title is also available online at http://press.anu.edu.au National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry Title: Antarctica - music, sounds and cultural connections / edited by Bernadette Hince, Rupert Summerson, Arnan Wiesel. ISBN: 9781925022285 (paperback) 9781925022292 (ebook) Subjects: Australasian Antarctic Expedition (1911-1914)--Centennial celebrations, etc. Music festivals--Australian Capital Territory--Canberra. Antarctica--Discovery and exploration--Australian--Congresses. Antarctica--Songs and music--Congresses. Other Creators/Contributors: Hince, B. (Bernadette), editor. Summerson, Rupert, editor. Wiesel, Arnan, editor. Australian National University School of Music. Antarctica - music, sounds and cultural connections (2011 : Australian National University). Dewey Number: 780.789471 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher. Cover design and layout by ANU Press Cover photo: Moonrise over Fram Bank, Antarctica. Photographer: Steve Nicol © Printed by Griffin Press This edition © 2015 ANU Press Contents Preface: Music and Antarctica . ix Arnan Wiesel Introduction: Listening to Antarctica . 1 Tom Griffiths Mawson’s musings and Morse code: Antarctic silence at the end of the ‘Heroic Era’, and how it was lost . 15 Mark Pharaoh Thulia: a Tale of the Antarctic (1843): The earliest Antarctic poem and its musical setting . 23 Elizabeth Truswell Nankyoku no kyoku: The cultural life of the Shirase Antarctic Expedition 1910–12 .
    [Show full text]
  • ALS-MLA American Literature Section of the Modern Language
    ALS-MLA American Literature Section of the Modern Language Association ANNUAL REPORT, 2011 Compiled by Joycelyn Moody and Emily Broadwater, University of Texas at San Antonio CONTENTS Officers............................................................................................................................................2 The Hubbell Medal 2011…………...…………………................………………….…………....3 The Foerster Prize 2011………………………………..................……………….……………..5 Report from American Literature………………………………………………........…………....7 2012 MLA Convention Session......................................................................................................8 Lists from the Hubbell Center Chairs of the Section…………………………………………………………….…………...8 Executive Coordinators of the Section……………………………………...…...……...…...9 Winners of the Hubbell Medal…………………………………………….....……………...9 Winners of the Foerster Prize……………………………..……………........…………...…….....9 Upcoming MLA Conventions…………………………………………………………..……….11 1 American Literature Section Officers 2011 The executive coordinator and editor of American Literature are also members of the Advisory Council. Chair: Michael Moon, Emory U ALS-MLA Standing Committees Ex Officio:Elizabeth Maddock Dillon, Northeastern U Executive Coordinator: Joycelyn Moody, Nominating Committee: U of Texas, San Antonio Nancy Bentley, U of Pennsylvania, Chair Advisory Council Tina Chen, Pennsylvania State U Elected Members of the Council: Sheila Contreras, Michigan State U Priscilla Wald, Editor of American Literature Hubbell
    [Show full text]
  • Bartleby, the Scrivener a Story of Wall Street
    33171 03 0020-0050.ps 4/26/06 12:42 PM Page 20 HERMAN MELVILLE [1819–1891] Bartleby, the Scrivener A Story of Wall Street Born in New York City, the second son of well-established, affluent parents, Herman Melville (1819–1891) lived comfortably until he was eleven, when his father went bankrupt and moved the family to Al- bany. After his father’s death in 1832, Melville left school to work. In 1839 he sailed as a merchant seaman to Liverpool, and in 1841 as a whaleman to the South Pacific. On his return to the United States in 1844, he began immediately to write about his sea adventures. He wrote at an extraordinary pace, producing seven novels in six years, beginning with Typee (1846) and Omoo (1847), about the South Seas, and including Moby-Dick (1851) and Pierre (1852). The early novels were well-received, but Moby-Dick, now recognized as a masterpiece, was misunderstood and Pierre was considered a total failure. During this period Melville had married Elizabeth Shaw, daughter of the chief justice of Massachusetts; in 1850 the couple bought a farm near Pitts- field, Massachusetts, where the writer became close friends with Nathaniel Hawthorne. Despite serious financial problems and a slight nervous breakdown, Melville published stories and sketches in maga- zines — several of the best, including “Bartleby, the Scrivener” and “Benito Cereno,” were collected in The Piazza Tales (1856) — as well as the novels Israel Potter (1855) and The Confidence Man (1857) before turning almost exclusively to poetry for thirty years. Needing money, he sold the farm and worked as a customs inspector in New York City for twenty years; when his wife received a small inheritance he was able to retire.
    [Show full text]
  • Liminal Encounters and the Missionary Position: New England's Sexual Colonization of the Hawaiian Islands, 1778-1840
    University of Southern Maine USM Digital Commons All Theses & Dissertations Student Scholarship 2014 Liminal Encounters and the Missionary Position: New England's Sexual Colonization of the Hawaiian Islands, 1778-1840 Anatole Brown MA University of Southern Maine Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/etd Part of the Other American Studies Commons Recommended Citation Brown, Anatole MA, "Liminal Encounters and the Missionary Position: New England's Sexual Colonization of the Hawaiian Islands, 1778-1840" (2014). All Theses & Dissertations. 62. https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/etd/62 This Open Access Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Scholarship at USM Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in All Theses & Dissertations by an authorized administrator of USM Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. LIMINAL ENCOUNTERS AND THE MISSIONARY POSITION: NEW ENGLAND’S SEXUAL COLONIZATION OF THE HAWAIIAN ISLANDS, 1778–1840 ________________________ A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTERS OF THE ARTS THE UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN MAINE AMERICAN AND NEW ENGLAND STUDIES BY ANATOLE BROWN _____________ 2014 FINAL APPROVAL FORM THE UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN MAINE AMERICAN AND NEW ENGLAND STUDIES June 20, 2014 We hereby recommend the thesis of Anatole Brown entitled “Liminal Encounters and the Missionary Position: New England’s Sexual Colonization of the Hawaiian Islands, 1778 – 1840” Be accepted as partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts Professor Ardis Cameron (Advisor) Professor Kent Ryden (Reader) Accepted Dean, College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis has been churning in my head in various forms since I started the American and New England Studies Masters program at The University of Southern Maine.
    [Show full text]
  • Second Novel No End: an Open Letter to Ralph Ellison
    Second Novel No End 175 Second Novel No End: An Open Letter to Ralph Ellison Horace Porter March 8, 20141 Skirvin Hotel Oklahoma City Dear Ralph, I’ve arrived in Oklahoma City for the first time. I’m recalling how you and I talked about Oklahoma City the first time I visited you and Fanny at your Harlem apartment. I was twenty-six and a graduate student at Yale. I wrote you a letter during the fall of 1976. I received your reply just before Christmas—a long eloquent letter—a special Christmas gift indeed. The letter, which I still treasure, has evidence of your characteristic style and wit: “once I shocked a white man whose shoes I was shining by revealing that I was familiar with Freud’s theory of dreams, but neither of us was prepared to communicate on that level, for it would have placed too great a strain on the arrangements of social hierarchy—and on the two of us!”2 You suggested that I come to see you. On Friday, February 17, 1977, I visited you and Fanny. I’ve already written about that special day.3 Suffice it to say on this occasion that it was an unforgettable and inspiring afternoon. Now thirty-seven years later, I’m standing here in Oklahoma City’s Skirvin Hotel, where you worked as a teenager. I’m reading this open letter to you at a conference and symposium dedicated to your work. We’re also celebrating your 0026-3079/2015/5403-175$2.50/0 American Studies, 54:3 (2015): 175-184 175 176 Horace Porter hundredth birthday.
    [Show full text]
  • Uss "Vincennes"
    S. Hao, 100-1085 INVESTIGATION IfTO THE DOWNING OF AN IRANIAN AIRLINER BY THE U.S.S. "VINCENNES" HEARING BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES UNITED STATES SENATE ONE HUNDREDTH CONGRESS SECOND SESSION SEPTEMBER 8, 1988 Printed for the use of the Committee on Armed Services U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 90-853 WASHINGTON : 1989 For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, Congressional Sales Office U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC 20402 03o -" COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES SAM NUNN, Georgia, Chairman JOHN C. STENNIS, Mississippi JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia J. JAMES EXON, Nebraska STROM THURMOND, South Carolina CARL LEVIN, Michigan GORDON J. HUMPHREY, New Hampshire P)WARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetts WILLIAM S. COHEN, Maine JEFF BINGAMAN, New Mexico DAN QUAYLE, Indiana ALAN J. DIXON, Illinois PETE WILSON, California JOHN GLENN, Ohio PHIL GRAMM, Texas ALBERT GORE, JR., Tennessee STEVEN D. SYMMS, Idaho TIMOTHY E. WIRTH, Colorado JOHN McCAIN, Arizona RICHARD C. SHELBY, Alabama ARNOLD L. PuNARO, Staff Director CAu M. SMrm, Staff Director for the Minority CHRISTINS COWART DAUTH, Chief Clerk (II) CONTENTS CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF WITNESSES Page Fogarty, Rear Adm. William M., USN, Director of Policy and Plans, U.S. Central Command, and Head of the Investigation Team accompanied by Capt. George N. Gee, USN, Director, Surface Combat Systems Division, ice of the Chief of Naval Operations and Capt. Richard D. DeBobes, Legal Adviser and Legislative Assistant to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of S taff . .......................................................................................................................... 4 Kelly, Rear Adm. Robert J., USN, Vice Director for Operations, Joint Staff ..... 17 (III) INVESTIGATION INTO THE DOWNING OF AN IRANIAN AIRLINER BY THE U.S.S.
    [Show full text]
  • Ladies and Gentlemen
    reaching the limits of their search area, ENS Reid and his navigator, ENS Swan decided to push their search a little farther. When he spotted small specks in the distance, he promptly radioed Midway: “Sighted main body. Bearing 262 distance 700.” PBYs could carry a crew of eight or nine and were powered by two Pratt & Whitney R-1830-92 radial air-cooled engines at 1,200 horsepower each. The aircraft was 104 feet wide wing tip to wing tip and 63 feet 10 inches long from nose to tail. Catalinas were patrol planes that were used to spot enemy submarines, ships, and planes, escorted convoys, served as patrol bombers and occasionally made air and sea rescues. Many PBYs were manufactured in San Diego, but Reid’s aircraft was built in Canada. “Strawberry 5” was found in dilapidated condition at an airport in South Africa, but was lovingly restored over a period of six years. It was actually flown back to San Diego halfway across the planet – no small task for a 70-year old aircraft with a top speed of 120 miles per hour. The plane had to meet FAA regulations and was inspected by an FAA official before it could fly into US airspace. Crew of the Strawberry 5 – National Archives Cover Artwork for the Program NOTES FROM THE ARTIST Unlike the action in the Atlantic where German submarines routinely targeted merchant convoys, the Japanese never targeted shipping in the Pacific. The Cover Artwork for the Veterans' Biographies American convoy system in the Pacific was used primarily during invasions where hundreds of merchant marine ships shuttled men, food, guns, This PBY Catalina (VPB-44) was flown by ENS Jack Reid with his ammunition, and other supplies across the Pacific.
    [Show full text]
  • America's Undeclared Naval War
    America's Undeclared Naval War Between September 1939 and December 1941, the United States moved from neutral to active belligerent in an undeclared naval war against Nazi Germany. During those early years the British could well have lost the Battle of the Atlantic. The undeclared war was the difference that kept Britain in the war and gave the United States time to prepare for total war. With America’s isolationism, disillusionment from its World War I experience, pacifism, and tradition of avoiding European problems, President Franklin D. Roosevelt moved cautiously to aid Britain. Historian C.L. Sulzberger wrote that the undeclared war “came about in degrees.” For Roosevelt, it was more than a policy. It was a conviction to halt an evil and a threat to civilization. As commander in chief of the U.S. armed forces, Roosevelt ordered the U.S. Navy from neutrality to undeclared war. It was a slow process as Roosevelt walked a tightrope between public opinion, the Constitution, and a declaration of war. By the fall of 1941, the U.S. Navy and the British Royal Navy were operating together as wartime naval partners. So close were their operations that as early as autumn 1939, the British 1 | P a g e Ambassador to the United States, Lord Lothian, termed it a “present unwritten and unnamed naval alliance.” The United States Navy called it an “informal arrangement.” Regardless of what America’s actions were called, the fact is the power of the United States influenced the course of the Atlantic war in 1941. The undeclared war was most intense between September and December 1941, but its origins reached back more than two years and sprang from the mind of one man and one man only—Franklin Roosevelt.
    [Show full text]
  • Dissertation Rough Draft Final
    UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA RIVERSIDE Melville on the Beach: Transnational Visions of America A Dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English by Ikuno Saiki December 2018 Dissertation Committee: Dr. Jennifer Doyle, Chairperson Dr. Steven Gould Axelrod Dr. Traise Yamamoto Copyright by Ikuno Saiki 2018 The Dissertation of Ikuno Saiki is approved: Committee Chairperson University of California, Riverside Acknowledgments This project would not have been finalized without the invaluable assistance of many people. First of all, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my exam advisor and former dissertation chairperson, Professor Emory Elliott. Throughout the irregular and tedious process of completing my degree, he constantly encouraged me and supported me by frequent e- mail messages, writing from his office in early morning, or from a hotel in China at midnight, until a month before his sudden demise. I learned, and am still learning, from his enthusiastic and humanitarian approach to literature and from his pure devotion to help his students. Professor Jennifer Doyle was on my exam committee, and kindly succeeded Professor Elliott as chair. She made it possible for me to finish the dissertation within a limited amount of time, and her advice gave me a framework within which to integrate all my ideas. Professor Steven Gould Axelrod and Professor Traise Yamamoto supported me in the first difficult quarter at UC Riverside in 2001. I learned scholarship and the art of research from Professor Axelrod’s meticulous and warm suggestions on my seminar papers. Professor Yamamoto, who provides energetic guidance and affectionate care for her students, is one of my unattainable role models.
    [Show full text]
  • Meta Duewa Jones
    Meta DuEwa Jones Associate Professor Department of English and Comparative Literature/University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill Greenlaw Hall, CB #3520/Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3520 (919) 962-5481/[email protected] EDUCATION Stanford University, Ph.D., English and American Literature, 2001 Stanford University, M.A., English, 1996 Princeton University, B.A., English, magna cum laude, 1995 Princeton University, Certificate, Afro-American Studies, 1995 PROFESSIONAL ACADEMIC EXPERIENCE Associate Professor, Department of English, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill 2018-pres. Associate Professor, Department of English, Howard University 2013-2017 Co-Director, Texas Institute for Literary & Textual Studies, University of Texas, Austin 2011-2012 Associate Professor, Department of English, UT-Austin 2011-2013 Associate Professor, Department of African and African Diaspora Studies, UT-Austin 2011-2013 Assistant Professor, Department of English, UT-Austin 2005-2010 Assistant Professor, Department of English, George Washington University 2001-2005 Visiting Scholar, Carter G. Woodson Institute, University of Virginia 2000-2001 Graduate Program Coordinator, Dean of Students Office, Stanford University 1998-1999 Research Assistant, Stanford University, Department of English 1999-2000 Teaching Fellow, Program in African American Studies, Stanford University 1998 Teaching Assistant, Department of English, Stanford University 1997 Writing and Critical Thinking Instructor, Department of English, Stanford University 1996-1997 FELLOWSHIPS AND GRANTS
    [Show full text]
  • ABSTRACT POWELL, ETHEL ANNE. Ghosts of Chances for Redemption
    ABSTRACT POWELL, ETHEL ANNE. Ghosts of Chances for Redemption via Abjection in Wilson Harris’s Palace of the Peacock and Others. (Under the direction of Deborah Wyrick.) This thesis explores, in three works of literature, possibilities for redemption via abjection. Julia Kristeva’s semanalysis is the primary theoretical tool with which Aphra Behn’s Oroonoko (1688) is examined as a nascent work in Caribbean literature. Next, and central to this thesis, the Guyanese Wilson Harris’s The Palace of the Peacock (1960) is discussed within Kristevan context and within Caribbeanist literary critical context. Mariella, a central and fluid character in Palace, acts as a semiotic agent of destruction and of abjectly sublime redemption for Donne and his crew of river boatmen in pursuit of Other ethnically mixed peoples in Guyana’s interior. Donne’s moment of epiphany, wherein he comes to understand how inhumanely he has treated Others, is followed by his “second” death and rebirth in a celestial palace (along with the rest of the crew), marking his and their transformation from abject slavers to abjectly sublime and redeemed beings. The semiotic linguistic characteristics of Palace are investigated: while written in the style of Magical Realism, Palace contains lexical and dialectal features stemming from African and Amerindian influences. Flannery O’Connor’s “Revelation” (1965) is the final work examined. Via legacies of plantation slavery and ensuing discrimination against freed African-Americans, many works of Southern U.S. literature contain qualities of postcolonial literatures, particularly the element of abject Otherness. In “Revelation” Mrs. Ruby Turpin’s ideas about abject Others are transformed, as she is transformed from an abject avatar of white Southern racism and classism, into an abjectly sublime person who receives a “revelation” of her wrongs righted in a celestial march of all human beings.
    [Show full text]